Pastor Hurst

A GOD WORTH KEEPING

“The problem with getting rid of God is that you get rid of God.” This, I kept thinking in the middle of a funeral service last week. Whatever the ostensible reasons in exposition, the vapor-thin varnishes of pseudo-science, or the babbles of psycho-philosophies, the motivation and the end goal for much of academia and culture in particularly the past two centuries has been to get rid of God. The triumphant twisting and then touting of the evolutionary theory has led to naturalists declaring their delight at there being no Deity. No God to worry about looking over one’s shoulder in life. No God to worry about having to face in the afterlife. No accountability now. No judgment later. Well done, naturalists. Well done, humanists. Well done, atheists. You’ve gotten rid of God. How wonderful! Or is it? The problem with getting rid of God is that you have gotten rid of God. Now, for you who have ditched God, there is no more answer to the “why” of the origin question. Nothing to give meaning and purpose for living. Nothing transcendent to give value to the dirt, the accidental conglomerate of chemicals, the collection of instincts that humanity is. No absolutes to serve as a measure of morality. No beauty, or, at least, no reason or meaning to the beauty. There is no sense in anything. Not really. Congratulations! But it gets even worse. When you’ve gotten rid of God, there also is no hope in the many hopeless conditions that inevitably come. What is, well, simply, is. There is no comfort in times of hurt and loss. No mere human can know, understand or assuage the loss of one dearly loved. The is no basis for real trust following betrayal or abandonment. There is no model or experience of true love for humans to emulate. There is nothing to insert into the interior emptiness so shaped that only God can fill it. There is nothing for the yen within. There’s nothing in our world from our world that can reach much less scratch the itches of the soul. There’s no salvation for the lostness. A cornucopia consortium of money, people, education, therapies, career success, etc., cannot erase the feeling of this lostness. There’s no footing for forgiveness. There’s only bitterness, sourness, hatred, and strife. There’s no expunging of sin or guilt or shame—only a dulling denial that rots the soul, or worse, hardens it making it calloused and cauterized. However bad it is to have gotten rid of God in life, it’s worse to have gotten rid of Him in death. With no God, there is no heaven. There is no justice. There are no rewards. There is no vindication. There are no righting wrongs. There is no redemption, reclamation, or restoration. There is no continuance of a person, only annihilation and oblivion. There is no ultimate beauty, fulfillment, or knowledge. There is no reunion with departed loved ones. There is no healing of terminal diseases. There is no wholeness for the injured, handicapped, or broken. Pop culture rejoicing over having gotten rid of God needs to know that by getting rid of God it has, well, gotten rid of God. People today, in the metaphor I used to hear often as a child, have “cut off their nose to despite their face.” If they could only see—or “smell”: Getting rid of God has been and is a detriment to each of them personally, to their families, to their culture, to their country. But getting rid of God they’ve gotten rid of God. Only, they haven’t. They may self-congratulate themselves throughout their remaining years that they have gotten rid of God, and live accordingly. But, when they each in turn die, they will come face to face with the God they had convinced themselves they’d gotten rid of. This all reminds me of a story I first read so many years ago that I may botch some of the details. It might even be apocryphal. That won’t change its point: During the space race of the 1960s, the atheistic, communist Russians were the first to put a man in orbit. As his spacecraft circled the earth, he radioed back to ground his observations from his celestial vantage point. Smirkingly, he pontificated, “You, know, they (the Western world), say there is a God. Well, here I am up in space. I’ve looked around everywhere up here, and I see no God.” A British radio announcer reported the cosmonaut’s words and followed it with, “If he would step out of that cockpit, he would see Him in a hurry.” How true. You can’t get rid of God. The technology for spacewalks had not yet been developed. Had the cosmonaut “stepped out of the cockpit,” he would have discovered in a “hurry” that he had not gotten rid of God. If only that cosmonaut would have realized that he didn’t have to step out of the cockpit to see God. God, a forgiving, saving God, was right there in the cockpit with him. One can only believe he’s gotten rid of the God that he’s gotten rid of. He hasn’t. But, because of the mercy and grace of the God he’s gotten rid of, he can come to believe in the God he thought he’d gotten rid of. That’s a God worth keeping. --Pastor Clifford Hurst

“IT’S ABOUT KILLING BABIES”

It failed: There was an urgency about Issue 1 up for a vote in Ohio this past week. The issue was about whether or not to raise the qualifications for the initiation of an amendment to our constitution from 51% to 60%. Only it wasn’t really about that. It appeared to be a question of checks and balances in our government. Only it wasn’t. Opponents of raising the threshold of a qualifying amendment insisted that it was about democracy. Only it wasn’t. Opponents outspent supporters 2-1. The source and amount of money spent to defeat it reveals the issue, despite protestations, wasn’t about democracy. Personally, I, considering only whether it was beneficial for our system of governance or our constitution, was never sure if Issue 1 was legitimately needed or good--if a yes vote was the right vote. But it wasn’t really about those things. Knowing what it was really about, I voted yes. If one truly voted no for the reasons I just listed, I would not malign them or their vote. But it wasn’t about those things. All along, both the prescient and honest and the devious and designing knew Issue 1 wasn’t about Issue 1. It was about subsequently attempting to amend the Ohio Constitution to legalize abortion. An amendment to the constitution legalizing abortion would protect it from legislative action or judicial ruling. Excluding those who were deceived into thinking, or who honestly believed it was a question of governance, for the preponderance of those who opposed it, Issue 1 was about killing babies. Most support of Issue 1 was about NOT killing babies. Opposition wasn’t just about killing babies but making it more convenient to kill babies. Anecdotes and statistics have been shared again and again by near-weeping promulgators of abortion of how women have had to travel outside of Ohio to a nearby state to have an abortion. Websites have labeled Ohio “hostile” towards those seeking an abortion. After the Supreme Court’s overturn of Roe vs Wade, the Ohio legislators passed the heartbeat law (6 weeks) and our governor signed it into law. The court has blocked it. This has reverted Ohio back to the allowance of abortion up to 22 weeks. That does not satisfy many folks. Afraid of an appeal court’s decision to allow the heartbeat law or in order to push for even later-term abortions, an intensive move was made to defeat Issue 1. These motives, though evident prior to the election by those paying attention, were revealed in the reaction to the Issues’ being defeated with 60% voting no. With a palpable giddy glee and unmasked delight, victorious opponents relieved and rejoicing immediately spoke of getting an issue on the November ballot to enshrine abortion with an amendment. Wednesday morning after the election, I finished an article on a paper’s front page that described people’s delight and said to my wife, “They’re not rejoicing over having defeated Issue 1. They are rejoicing over killing babies.” Though the jubilant claimed they were rejoicing about safeguarding democracy, or a win for women’s health, or about a victory for women’s choice, or a success for their political party, in reality, they were rejoicing because there seems now to be a path opened to get back to killing more babies in Ohio. People view issues through layers upon layers of punditry, commentary, sloganeering, and jingoistic jingles, and fail to see them for what they really are. Indubitably, there are truly complex questions about the extenuating, horrific crises of some expectant mothers--cases of concern and cause for real sympathy for a mother’s medical condition. And to say that these are rare is not to minimize their tragedy. But, when all the layers are peeled away, the end resultant reality, is that babies are being killed. And, in the end, there is but a fractional percentage where the baby, in fact, had to be killed. Left alone, these babies would have lived. No amount of redefining what is developing in a mother’s womb is going to change the reality that what is in there is a baby. And no other way of styling it is going to change that abortion is the killing of a baby. Despite those genuinely deceived, despite those whose misguided intentions are noble, caring, and empathetic, despite their being tragic circumstances in a minuscule amount of cases, in the end, the clamoring for abortion is a call for killing babies. Those who so clamor are those, “Who rejoice to do evil, and delight in the frowardness of the wicked;” (Pro 2:14). The current push in our culture to legalize abortion everywhere is by those who rejoice in doing evil. They not only celebrated abortion's legalization wherever they are victorious, they want to coerce others to celebrate with them. We will not. We cannot. We instead weep. Why? It’s about killing babies. --Pastor Clifford Hurst

A MOUNTAIN IN THE MAKING

“They are so beautiful!” I heard this again and again over the past week vacationing with my wife’s family in the interior of Colorado. Whenever someone looked out of the windows or off the deck of our lodge that was surrounded by them, “They are so beautiful.” When we took a train ride and looked out to the horizon to a distant higher range, “They are so beautiful!” And of the surrounding ones from the top of the tallest in the vicinity, “They are so beautiful!” And they were. What? What were so beautiful? The mountains! In order not to ruin the experience in the moment, when any remarked on the beauty of the mountains, I suppressed the urge to inquire, “Beautiful? Do you know how those mountains were formed? The process was anything but beautiful. It was ugly. If the earth had nerves, it was excruciatingly painful. Wherever there are mountains, there has been a collision. Two continental plates have collided with each other. The speed was immaterial. The tremendous force at impact and the growing tension afterward wasn’t. Similar in size, one plate refused to sink beneath or give to the other. Much like dueling elk bucks, horns locked and each pawing forward. The force between the two began to crush and crumble the rock at the point of contact. Edges broken off from the plates were shoved upwards at steep angles from the horizontal plane. And, voila, mountains! Mountains are the remains of a wreck between tectonic plates. Think of a car wreck. In the rest of reality, the remains of wrecks are ugly. Sad. Unsightly. Horrifying. Not so with the wreck of the earth’s plates. The remains of the wrecks are beautiful. The remains are mountains. And mountains are beautiful. Often in our lives, we are hit by things with devastating impact. Out of nowhere. Betrayals of relationships. Bad reports of an MRI. Chronic illnesses. Rejection. Loss of a job. Life-changing injury. Ruin of home. Opposing forces collide into our lives dashing our dreams, hazarding our hopes, ripping apart our relationships, fracturing our friendships, crushing our contentment, and pulverizing our peace. What happens is ugly, painful, and devastating. Without God. Without Grace. Without Love. Without faith, the end result of these cataclysmic forces in our lives would be as ugly and unsightly as their cause. But not so with God. The same God that used the ugly forces of the collision and crumbling of tectonic plates to form mountains uses the ugly forces that slam into the lives of those who put their trust in Him to bring about something beautiful. As Joseph succinctly and poignantly put it: “You meant it for evil but God for good.” It was ugly, but God made it beautiful. No one calls wrecked cars beautiful. Nor homes crushed by tornadoes. But wrecked plates of rocks? People look at those and say, “Beautiful!” Could not mountains be enigmatic reminders from God? Reminders that, because He is providentially involved in all that happens in the lives of His children, whatever devasting forces slam into us leaving behind horrible and hurtful wreckage, He can turn even all of that into something beautiful? Yes! The ashes, He makes beautiful. The mourning, an oil of joy. The spirit of heaviness, a garment of praise. The splinters of damage, stately trees of grace. The upheaval of wreckage, beautiful. Do not all things work together for good to those who are called to and love God? Next time you look at a panorama of mountains and find yourself exclaiming, “They are so beautiful!” remember that they are the remains of an ugly cataclysm. A wreck. They are the detritus of a demolishing disaster. And then remember that God can do the same with the ruins and wreckage of a life, a dream, and a past. All that has been horrible. Painful. Devastating. That wreckage God turns into beautiful mountains. That devastation is not just a miserable mess. It’s a mountain in the making*. ---Pastor Clifford Hurst *Mountains once so formed, continue to grow. God not only brings beauty from the impact of adversity and devastation, He brings growth.

“TWO GRANDPAS IN ONE PLACE”

Fortuitously, this month, my son in the military, with his family, moved back to Dayton, OH. That’s where my wife and I pastor. Although he is army, he has been posted at the Wright Patterson Airforce Base to attend the Air Force Institute of Technology for further training. We are blessed to have them back with us, Mom and Dad, and back at our church. Last night, Wednesday, after service, a group of us were standing at the front of the sanctuary chatting. That group included my son and his father-in-law and others. My son’s children came in from their kids’ classes and, seeing us, down to we were gathered. One of them, my six-year-old grandson looked up at me and then over at his other grandfather. He rolled his eyes upward, shook his head from side to side, put his hands to his cheeks, and dramatically proclaimed, “Two grandpas in one church!” I could not tell if he was wowed or whelmed. I’ll take it he was wowed. Wow! “I have two grandpas in one church. At one place. I have both of them here for me.” At first, I mused over his rhetorical almost poetic expression--one with a mathematical ratio as well (2 to 1). Then, I began to ruminate over just what it was that made “two grandpas in one place” remarkable to him. I guess I could just ask him, but, however bardic he may be, I’m not sure he could articulate what was really impressing him about his observation. Also, he might have given me a different answer than where my thoughts took me and aborted this blog. So, rather than asking him, I will venture a conjecture: Relationships. I think it was relationships that he had in mind. We two weren’t just other people to him. We were grandpas. We each were someone with whom he had a relationship. A familial relationship. A binding relationship. A dependable relationship. A secure relationship. And, I surmise his thought behind his words was, “Just think, I have two of those relationships right here in one place. How nice.” This is how church should be for everyone. When we gather, it should be both a reality and an awareness that we gather with those with whom we have close relationships. That is why from the beginning--though the Church has departed from the practice even in my lifetime--believers referred to each other as “Brother” or “Sister.” In Christ, even someone further removed than a 6thcousin was a brother. So was a stranger who knew Christ that had dropped in for a visit. There are many instances in the New Testament that reveal what close relationships those who gathered for worship had. But I thought of how Paul expressed it to converts and his flock in Philippi. He gets almost syrupy: “Therefore, my brethren dearly beloved and longed for, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, my dearly beloved.” (Php 4:1). “Brethren.” “Dearly beloved.” “Longed for.” Relationship. Church, according to the NT, is all about one anothering. Love one another. Greet one another. Pray for one another. Consider one another. Serve one another. Exhort one another. And one anothering is about relationships. Sadly, there has been an erosion of such relationships in churches everywhere. Goers have become mere mutual attendees. They are but simultaneous spectators of the same production. Cliques are bad. Clashes are bad. But capsuled self-absorbed individuals are the worst. The Church, each locally expressed body, is designed to be a unity comprised of organic relationships. Relationships deeper, closer even than the ones we have with those with whom we share DNA but not faith. Closer than the bonds of those on a sports team. Closer than drinking or fishing buddies. Closer than Facebook friends. Close. Family close. Coming to church, we ought to sigh contentedly, “All these brothers and sisters in one place!” But there are more relationships at church than just those with our fellow brothers and sisters. We gather with our heavenly Father. And our Elder-Brother and Friend, Jesus. And our confidant, comforter, and counselor, the Holy Spirit. The Blessed Trinity. The Three in One. We have a relationship with God. This is why coming to church, and gathering together, is so vital and crucial; especially so in our fractured world where even biological families are fragmented. When we are together, we ought to be saying, “All those relationships in one place. Wow!” On Sunday, when you gather, as all believers should, you ought to look up to heaven with gratitude. Roll your eyes back in wonder. Shake your head back and forth in amazement, put your hands to your face in astonishment, and, with a WOW like my grandson, exclaim, “All these relationships in one place!” Oh, by the way. I have a one-up on my grandson. He said, “Two grandpas in one place.” Now, when I come to church I can say, “Three grandchildren in one place!” --Pastor Clifford Hurst

“Do We Get The Ribbons Now?”

He was so disappointed and crestfallen when I told him that I regretted having answered him. But I had to tell the truth. We were in our church’s kids’ camp. I was down the hill on the ballfield watching the children compete in track events. The one in progress was the long jump time. When one eight-year-old’s distance was announced, he knew he had won first! His face lit up with joy. First place! Seeing me, the pastor, standing nearby, thinking I would know, he looked up at me and asked, “Do we get the ribbons now?” His smile disappeared and his face fell when I answer, “No, not now. Later. You will get your ribbon at the awards ceremony in the tabernacle up there on the hill on the last day.” I felt bad for spoiling his joy of victory. But I was immediately struck by his question and my answer. It is a disappointment to learn this hard fact: We don’t get the ribbons now. They come later. It was then that I thought of my Aunt Mil and Uncle Dale. They had had no children. I moved them from California to Ohio to care for them when they retired. My aunt passed away first. Then my uncle. It fell to me to close their estate and get rid of their things. They had no estate. Their things were pitiful. For most of their adult lives they had pastored on Native American reservations and at small churches. On the limited incomes from those, they had acquired almost nothing. After my aunt had passed, my uncle, having suffered debilitating illness had been residing in assisted living. When he died and I was clearing his room, I found nothing of intrinsic value--not really, except a tv and a silver dollar. These with some memory-laden knickknacks I laid aside. The rest of the things I donated to the facility for another indigent resident and threw the rest away. As I put some dilapidated piece of furniture into the trash bin, I felt a heavy weight of sadness laden with bitterness. I’m not sure if I said it out loud or not. But I murmured: “They spent all their life in ministry. Faithfully. And they died and have nothing to show for it. Nothing but a few worthless things that I’m throwing away.” I can’t explain the dark cloud that descended upon me. Then, I remembered the story of the poor, retiring missionary and his wife disembarking in New York City on their return from Africa. Ex-president Teddy Roosevelt was returning on the same ship from a big game hunting trip. In the Big Apple, he was greeted by a huge crowd with an exuberant welcome. No one was there to greet the missionaries. Not after all those years of faithful labor. No celebration for them. I have to butcher the story with brevity to get to the reply to the missionary’s anguishing self-pitying observation: Through the gloom of his grumbling, he heard: “But you are not home yet!” The words were not the same but that is what I had told the victorious young man, “You don’t get the ribbons now, they come later.” Here’s the point. There was no doubt that the young man had won! He had. But, despite his accomplishment, he hadn’t yet received his ribbon. He had no evidence to show he had won. He had nothing to show for what he had done. He had not been rewarded. Many, today, are right there with the young man, my aunt and uncle, and the returning missionaries. They have been faithful believers in Jesus. They have faithfully served Him and others. They have faithfully plodded through the valleys, fought the satanic enemies, and resisted the world's allurements. They have been victorious. They have done great work. They have helped others. But they have nothing to show for it. They have that same experience of disappointment experienced by the boy on the ballfield. "You don’t get the ribbons now." But make no mistake. The ribbons are coming. That young man did receive his ribbon later. He stood there proudly on stage holding it as the audience applauded. He had gotten his reward! On the last day. In the tabernacle up there on the hill. Weary worker, fighting faithful one, disillusioned minister, no, we do not receive the ribbons now. But we will. There is a reward ceremony coming. Despite an interval between the work and the winnings, the race and the recompense, the adversity withstood and the approval expressed, the good done and the garland, the cross-bearing and the crown, and the labor and the Lord saying, “Well done,” there will be a day when we “get the ribbons.” Have we received the ribbons? No. Not yet. But we will. For sure. In the ceremony in the Tabernacle. On the last day. Up on Zion’s Hill: “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.” (Gal 6:9). --Pastor Clifford Hurst

IS THE HOLY SPIRIT A DOVE?

Why am I thinking of and blogging about the Holy Spirit as a dove for this Sunday? Because today the children’s camp that our church has operated over the last 37 years begins. We call it Camp Dove. Also, the icon we use in the branding of our Pentecostal church is a dove. What’s all this about a dove? Ask anyone with even a rudimentary exposure to Christianity about the baptism of Jesus in Jordan and immediately there will come to his mind a picture of Jesus standing in the river, water running from Him and a dove either about to land or, having already landed, perched on His shoulder. A white feathered dove. After all, this is what all four Gospel writers described. Jesus in Jordan with the Holy Spirit embodied in a dove upon Him. Or do they? The art of the Church has led many to believe they did. The iconic renditions of Jesus’ baptism appear in every denomination (or nearly so), with Jesus freshly baptized and a literal dove resting on His shoulder. Something not considered is this: John the Baptist, the closest to Christ in Jordan, testified clearly that once the Holy Spirit had descended on Jesus like a dove, that the Spirit “remained” on Jesus. If the Holy Spirit descended as a literal dove, then, not only at His baptism but throughout His ministry, the dove remained on Jesus. Jesus walked around with a dove on His shoulder. Or head. Please forgive me if this sounds sacrilegious, but are we to believe Jesus walked the roads with his disciples, entered the temple, or preached in the synagogues with a dove perched on His shoulder like Long John Silver had a parrot? And, another thing, personally, I’ve always had a bit of difficulty thinking of the Holy Spirit embodied as an extremely close cousin to a pigeon, distinguishable only by being a bit smaller. Symbols are good—and that is what the dove in our branding is. But when they become icons, they can lead at the least to bad theology and at worst to idolatry, iconolatry. Yet, the Gospel records of Jesus’ baptism have inextricably linked the Holy Spirit with the dove. However, a re-examination of those accounts, I believe, reveals that they never say the Holy Spirit is a dove. Of course, not. Nor, even that the Holy Spirit appeared in the small shape of a dove. No. The emphasis is upon His descent, not his shape. All four Gospel writers concur. * The Holy Spirit DESCENDED LIKE a dove. Before I unpack some of the significance of that, let me make a special note: The Holy Spirit’s coming upon Jesus was a sign for John the Baptist. How would John know who the Messiah was when he saw him? ** The One who sent John instructed him “...upon whom thou shall see the Holy Spirit descending and remaining on him,” that will be the Messiah. Note, God did not tell John “...upon whom you see a DOVE descend, but upon whom you see the SPIRIT descend. Later, John testified that he did see the Spirit descend upon Jesus—like a dove. By implication of the text, only Jesus and John saw the Spirit descend. Thus, not only may the people not have seen the Spirit descend, they for sure saw no dove. The emphasis isn’t on the “what” the Holy Spirit descended as, but the “how” He descended, "came down." John, Jesus, their followers, and any who might have heard them tell this were Jews. They understood what was going on intuitively from their being so well-versed in Scripture. This language of descent like a dove immediately called to mind the beginning of their Torah--and the beginning of all things. “… And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” (Gen 1:2). “Moved.” The Spirit brooded above the dark chaos like a dove hovers and broods over her eggs. She does so in the expectation that the eggs will hatch and life will come forth. The Spirit’s moving precipitates the work of God. And that work is to give life. During Creation, when the Spirit finished hovering like a dove, the darkness was gone and life filled this planet. And a clump of clay called man began to live. Whatever the certain import of the Holy Spirit’s coming upon Jesus for equipping and empowering Him for his ministry might be, the Holy Spirit descended upon Christ to bring forth the work of God, and that work would dispel darkness and bring life. I have left too little space for application, but let me focus on just one: Note that the Holy Spirit descended like a dove on CHRIST. 1) The Holy Spirit COMES upon Christ. 2) As John testified, the Holy Spirit POINTS to Christ. 3) And, also, as John said, the Holy Spirit REMAINED upon Christ. If we desire the Holy Spirit’s descent in our lives and worship, we must realize He comes only upon Christ in our lives. In our thoughts. In our worship. He also comes upon our pointing to Christ. pointing to Christ in our worship, evangelism, preaching, and living. And He will remain upon the Christ in our lives and living, the Christ in whom we are "hid." Abide in Christ and the Holy Spirit will abide upon you. The Dove will abide with you as He did with Christ. Fittingly, one year at our Camp Dove, just as we were about to begin the opening service, as I was walking to the tabernacle, I watched a white dove come out of nowhere and fly over it. Not for a moment did I think it was the Holy Spirit. But I did think, “Just like that dove flew over the tabernacle, the Holy Spirit can descend upon the gathered crowd of children and those of all ages tonight. His presence can be felt. His power can be evident. His work can be done. I entered the tabernacle praying, “Holy Spirit descend upon us like a dove.” Descend like a dove upon Christ—the Christ within us and in Whom we are. --Pastor Clifford Hurst * It is Luke’s account, I believe, that gives rise to the icon of the dove or Jesus’ shoulder. He adds a description to the Spirit’s descent like a dove. “Bodily shape.” People have taken that to mean something like in a dove’s body or a body like a dove. However, the descent of the Spirit was in the “bodily shape.” A body isn’t just used in reference to biological corporeality. “Body” was used to describe something that was distinctly different than what is around it. A body of water. There is water all through the air. But when water is collected together in a way it can be seen, we call it a body of water. The Holy Spirit is omnipresent. Everywhere. But He was manifest that day, in a manner within parameters that He was distinctly and empirically seen. Thus, “bodily shape.” To say, then that the Spirit descended “in a bodily shape like a dove” is to say He came empirically, experientially, and existentially, upon Jesus, He can also come upon a people. A people can know when the Spirit is present, hovering, descending. Such a coming is real. It is life-changing. **Well, just as the Holy Spirit had let the embryo John in his mother’s womb know when he was in the presence of the Messiah in His mother’s womb, God had told John that he would know the adult Messiah when he saw the Holy Spirit descended upon Him.